Oregon Men Basketball

Tour of Italy left for next summer

The Oregon men’s basketball team has decided to postpone its exhibition tour of Italy until next year because of a limited roster of healthy players.

The Ducks will officially announce the change of plans today, it was learned Thursday.

UO coach Dana Altman was not available for comment Thursday evening but has a previously scheduled media availability today where it is anticipated he will explain his reasoning for delaying the trip.

While a foreign tour had been planned for this summer even with previous coach Ernie Kent, Altman had regularly warned that he wouldn’t go through with the trip unless he felt confident he had enough healthy players to be competitive against the Italian teams.

With four players having transferred since the end of last season, Oregon’s current roster includes only 10 scholarship players for Altman’s first season. One of those, senior LeKendric Longmire, was not going to make the trip to Italy to allow him to stay in Eugene and complete summer-session classes.

The Ducks were also being cautious with Joevan Catron, the team’s other senior, who missed the final 28 games of last season because of an ailing back. Catron said this week he was feeling confident his health wouldn’t be an issue, and wanted to test his back in game conditions though he had participated fully in the first five days of practices.

In addition, a handful of other players have nagging injuries that have sometimes limited them in practices over the first week of workouts. Altman said one of his concerns was that continuing to practice and then playing a series of games over about a 10-day span in Italy could aggravate those injuries and cause players to still be recovering when workouts resume for the regular season.

As recently as Tuesday, Altman said that while he was hopeful of going, it still wasn’t definite that the Ducks would make the trip because of the limited roster. That practice had ended with only six scholarship players participating.

What isn’t known are the financial implications of calling off the trip at this late date, with the Ducks scheduled to depart Monday, and what ramifications there will be from the Ducks practicing for a trip they aren’t taking. The UO will probably have to ask for an NCAA ruling on whether the team will lose practice time this fall, or can delay any penalty until preparations for a trip next summer.

Schools on the quarter system, such as Oregon, are allowed to begin limited workouts on Sept. 15, but for no longer than eight hours per week. Every team can then begin official practices with daily workouts for the season on Oct. 15.